The immigrants fueling the population growth of West Bank settlements
’We’ve already stopped counting the numbers, but in some, they are almost half the population,’ Knesset speaker tells settler activists
Judy Maltz Jun 07, 2017
read more: ▻http://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/1.794073
Immigrants to Israel account for as much as half the population at some West Bank settlements, Knesset Speaker Yuli Edelstein told settler activists attending a parliamentary committee meeting on Tuesday.
“Tens of thousands of immigrants have been warmly welcomed – not forcibly moved – to the settlements of Judea and Samaria,” he said, referring to the West Bank. “We’ve already stopped counting the numbers, but in some, they are almost half the population ... their contribution has been considerable.”
Edelstein was addressing a special session of the Knesset Committee for Immigration, Absorption and Diaspora Affairs on the role of immigrants in the settlement movement to mark the 50th anniversary of the Six Day War. The settlements began after Israel captured the West Bank from Jordan in that war.
Edelstein, a former Soviet refusenik and member of the ruling Likud party, is an outspoken advocate of the settlement movement. A former minister of immigrant absorption, he lived until recently in the West Bank settlement of Alon Shvut.
The Knesset committee meeting was attended by several mayors of West Bank settlements as well as a delegation of immigrants that live across the West Bank. Most of the members of this delegation were converts from what are known as “emerging Jewish communities” – in particular the Bnei Menashe from northeast India and the Bnei Moshe, also known as the Inca Jews, from Peru. These are communities whose members, after having undergone Orthodox conversions in the early 2000s, were brought to Israel by private organizations affiliated with the religious right and moved to West Bank settlements to boost the population there.
